Local communities influencing public service delivery

Posted by Rachel Rowney, NANM programme manager

The Cotmanhay Neighbourhood Management Group (CNMG) in Erewash, Derbyshire was a resident led partnership group which was formed in 2006 to lead the development and delivery of the Safer Stronger Communities Funded Programme. Supported by a neighbourhood manager and backed by a government grant the group worked to fund local community projects and influence the design and delivery of public services in the local area.

The local authority decided not to continue to fund the neighbourhood manager post in 2010 after neighbourhood element funding came to an end. This is not a situation particular to Erewash. Lots of local authorities are vastly reducing or cutting neighbourhood management, and posts that support local people influence how public services operate.

So, what has the result of the cuts to neighbourhood management, and similar initiatives been? In crude terms communities have responded in one of two ways.

In some areas communities have built on the foundations left behind by the previous initiatives, and used the lack of central government guidance/control to organise themselves around a special interest or geographic area that they have identified and are using their collective voice to influence public services.

The Cotmanhay Neighbourhood Management Group is now Action4Cotmanhay and is being led by a group of local residents, who organised events and seek to influence local public services, including Erewash and Derbyshire councils, Three Valleys Housing Association, police and the Derbyshire Primary Care Trust.

Out of the New Deal for Communities programme local people in Bradford have established a community council. This covers the Little Horton ward, and 12 councillors represent the six mini-wards into which the area has been divided. In Queen’s Park, Westminster local people have developed plans to turn the forum that used to be funded by area-based grant into a community council.

These are great examples of grassroots community action led by local residents. Local people are self-organising and are able to do this in a way that makes sense to them. Credit should also be given to the public services that are engaging and behaving in a way which enables, supports and amplifies the impact that these groups have without creating new bureaucratic structures.

However in other areas that have cut neighbourhood management nothing has materialised in its place. Public services shouldn’t assume that groups don’t ‘pop up’ because no-one cares, or that local people don’t understand the local area, or that they don’t have suggestions for how the public sector could be changed to better suit the needs of the local area, or that local people lack social capital. It could be that public services aren’t asking local people about things they care about. So, the question is how can these communities be enabled and supported in areas where there is no longer, or never was a neighbourhood manager?

Firstly, the lack of central government guidance on what neighbourhood structures should look like should be embraced by public services. This means supporting, encouraging and enabling residents to create groups which make sense to local people, and represent the things that they are passionate about. In areas that have cut neighbourhood management the local authority has replaced it with area or neighbourhood forums or committees, often chaired by a local councillor and attended by a mixture of frontline staff and service managers. While I recognise that they have a place – they often don’t create the dynamics required that enable the conversations that result in changes to public service delivery.

Secondly, learn from others. There are a growing number of examples that focus on local people influencing public services. Looking at what worked, and what failed in the local area and further afield is an important part of supporting local people.